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Topic: Getting Spoiled without a warning (Read 6544 times)

After work or school i do enjoy it to just sit down at home, switch on Youtube and watch some Lets Plays(Videos about People playing a game while doing commentary that is either pre planned or not) about games that look interresting.

A few months ago one of my favourite youtubers did a Playthrough of the game "The Last of us" and still has the Playlist of it on his channel.

Yesterday i watched his new DayZ (another game) episode where he mentioned something in passing about "The Last of us". Quote: "Just like in the end of The Last of us sometimes you got to do things for survival ...not out of moral choices"

A commenter under the video posted this:

Him: "Halfway through the video frankie spoils the last of us. I know he uploaded a series of it, but some of us chose not to watch it because we wanted to play the﻿ game ourselves... Try not to do this again please."

Me: In a time where Internet can give you pretty much instant access to anything it's hard not to get spoiled. The best would be not to be online for that time until you(general you) are done with the game/show/book =).

Him: You can﻿ talk about it all you want, at least give a warning or do it privately... and saying I should avoid a DayZ video because I haven't played TLOU is somewhat odd. Its just considerate, and common decency not to spoil things. I could go around spoiling Breaking Bad or The Walking Dead, but I don't.

Further Information about the Lets Player:- His Youtube Channel is mostly about Survival Games as well as First and Third Person shooters- His past Videos are all available on his Channel- He regularly mentions something from other Games. for example he mentions Metro:First Light during a DayZ Game Play.- The alleged Spoiler does not spoil any ending or incident of the game. It's rather reflecting the underlying feeling that you get while playing the character.- The LetsPlayer is rather good at not spoiling people.

I can understand that it is frustrating it is if you're looking forward to playing that game (or if we keep it general) reading a book or watching a movie and then you get spoiled by someone.But i'm wondering if the onus of keeping the spoilers away is really on those people that have already finished X?

I see the other poster's point about this: he didn't go seeking information about TLOU but got info anyway that he didn't want yet.

*But* if the whited-out text is all that was given away, I don't know that it was too much of a spoiler-- that's quite generic, isn't it? Like you said, this was more of an assessment of the game, not a reveal. If the video had content like like "it is just like game XYZ where you find out so-and-so is a traitor..." then I think the poster would have a case!

Getting spoiled is always sad. The headlines after The Red Wedding episode were some of the ones I read the most about recently, or more personally, my cousin's email the day after the last Downton Abbey episode where the spoiler was in the subject line and not avoidable! I unintentionally retaliated by mentioning something in my response to her (just innocently discussing the previous episodes) only to find that she had missed a particular one! Ha!

I think the one you mention was a bit general, but to the broader point, while it's hard to avoid on the internet, you can usually just refuse to seek out any content related to what you're reading/watching/playing, and it's really unfortunate when it gets dropped into some place unexpected.

Although it's really interesting how the pendulum swings! Before Tivo etc, you had to watch tv shows when they were aired, and all the fans would be talking about them together the next day. Then people were time shifting all over the place, or waiting for the DVDs, and spoilers were verboten! Now, you're encouraged to follow twitter, or post to other social media as you're watching and it's more of a community experience, so it's important to keep up again, lest your experience be diminished by not being able to discuss how LOST ended, because that is SO 2010! So if enough time has passed, it stops becoming a verboten spoiler any more - I mean, is it really a spoiler if someone references how Darcy and Elizabeth end up together in the end just because you haven't read a book published over 200 years ago?

There's also the consideration when something was released vs. when you're discussing it. If the tv show aired yesterday, don't talk about things openly today. It's all very subjective, particularly since some people consider hings like "Could you believe that twist?" to be a huge spoiler, or information from a tv show's "Next week on" to be spoilers.

My rule of thumb is don't spoiler things that a significant group of people can't possibly have seen yet (so, warn before an online discussion of a show that has so far aired in the US but not the UK, or vice versa), or that realistically most people haven't seen or read (a big fat novel that just came out a few days ago), and try to check with people on relatively recent things, or put discussions behind cut tags or the like. I read blogs that occasionally have "open thread to discuss $new book, expect spoilers in comments," set up so people can look at the front page of the blog and learn only that their friends are interested in the book in question.

There's some sort of statute of limitations or half-life, and I think a lot of disagreements are about the length of that half-life and whether it's affected by genre or how influential the work in question is. I don't think many people now would object to "it's his sled" or jokes about "Luke, I am your father," but some would mind a similar spoiler about the identity of the murderer even in a decades-old mystery novel, because that genre is in part about surprising the reader and/or the reader trying to solve a puzzle.

Logged

Any advice that requires the use of a time machine may safely be ignored.

I figure that it's polite to avoid public spoilers (twitter, facebook, talking to people without checking if they've seen it yet) for a reasonable amount of time. For a TV show - about 36 hours to cover different time zones. For a newly released movie - a few weeks. For a newly released book - about a month.

That way if someone really wants a pristine reading/watching experience they've had the opportunity to do so.

The flip side, of course, is that if someone wants a pristine, unspoiled experience with a newly released piece of media, they need to make an effort to see it quickly, and in the case of TV shows should probably avoid twitter and facebook while the show is actually being shown. Recording Game of Thrones on Sunday, with plans to watch it the following Friday, and expecting everyone to keep the events secret is not a good strategy if unspoiled viewing is very important too you.

(GoT is an interesting case, in that it's possible to spoil it before it airs, based on the source material. I knew that the Red Wedding was coming, and which episode it would show up in. I know at least two major shocking plot events that will probably occur next season (heh, heh, heh)).

The example given in the OP was *not* a spoiler - that was pretty generic information about the style of the game. Anything shown in the trailer or 'next week on' doesn't count as secret material. It's not a spoiler if you're discussing historical events (the ship in Titanic sinks!)

And if you get upset because someone just spoiled The Sixth Sense or The Crying Game for you, you're going way over the top. There's definitely a statute of limitations on shocking twist based movies or books.

FWIW, I live in Asia, and I get some stuff at the same time it's released in the US or Europe, but for other stuff it can be months to years before I get (legal) access to it. I just accept that as part of life here.

Interesting. I posted a thread here last year, about how the Facebook Page for "Being Human" (UK) revealed the death of a major character in Season 4 immediately after the episode had gone to air in the UK. The consensus on that thread appeared to be "as soon as the episode airs, it's fair game for the internet. People in different countries / timezones should stay off the internet if they don't want to be spoiled."

I personally think that unless it's a specific forum for discussing a show / game / book, then it's poor form to reveal a spoiler on social media in the first few weeks / months after it's released.

I remember someone getting up in arms about me comparing something to the ending of Terminator--less than two years ago.

When something's been out for a while, it becomes part of pop culture, especially the subculture to which it mostly belongs (e.g. survival games as in OP's story). It becomes a meme of its own. Not the lolcat kind, but a meme in the real sense of the word. It therefore becomes part of the way one communicates about its subculture or even pop culture in general. To discuss how a character was oedipal would intrinsically include a spoiler about the ancient Oedipus story, for example.

To expect someone not to spoil the end of things like that which have been out for months or years? Ridiculous. It will come up in other things of similar genres. Your loss. If you don't know who Luke Skywalker's father is, that isn't anyone else's problem or concern.

If it's the day or maybe week after a game has been released or television show has aired, though, then I think the polite thing to do is to make it explicit that you will reveal spoilers before discussing it, since it's reasonable to assume that a great deal of your audience hasn't seen it yet through no fault of their own.

The Last of Us has been out for almost three months. I feel that makes it fair to discuss when describing or comparing it with another game in a similar genre. It would be better to mention the presence of spoilers beforehand, just as an extra courtesy, but it is by no means required after this much time.

If it matters enough to someone not to have things spoiled, then it is their responsibility to watch/read/play it in a timely fashion, not for everyone else to tiptoe around them for months until they get around to it. I don't think the spoiler in the OP's example was rude at all.

I have a few friends who get seriously wacked about spoilers--freaking out as soon as anybody mentions a particular show, getting angry if someone posts a fairly mild spoiler on Facebook, that kind of thing. Honestly, it is starting to get on my nerves a bit. I know it's sad to be spoiled, and it's considerate to ask before giving away a major plot point, but if someone is going to lose their mind over *anything* even a bit spoilerish, I think it's on them to finish the movie/tv show/book in a relatively timely manner.

It gets a bit more complicated with things like The Hobbit or Game of Thrones, where the source material has been around for years but the rest of the movie/TV show isn't out yet. In that case I do think it's considerate not to spoil ahead of what's already out.

There are things that are *impossible* to avoid even right after, but I don't really see how to change that. Thinking about *that* episode of Game of Thrones--it was all over Facebook and Twitter within minutes. I think that's too bad in some ways, but it's also not really fair to tell people they can't be publically excited about their favourite show the day after it aired--waiting a week and people won't be as excited to have online discussions about it.

I would always try to avoid spoiling a huge major plot point if I didn't think people had seen it, but to avoid mentioning anything about it all, like the comment that was whited out, I think is not reasonable.

I try to avoid spoilers for things that are fairly recent. That being said, I had a friend yell at me because I was mentioning something that happened in a show. She's still watching season 1, and I'm mentioning season 4. And it was in the middle of airing season 8 that I mentioned it. Because I should know how far she'd seen.

I think the commenter was off base here. What I saw in white text doesn't actually spoil anything. If this video poster is known for doing posts about zombie or survival games, it's fairly common that characters will make choices based on survival and not morals. That's part of survival in those games. I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around the fact that the commenter thinks that nobody else should mention the game at all in a public forum until he has had a chance to play it. What if someone else hasn't had a chance to play it yet and dude wants to talk about it? Should he wait until everyone has played it? If that's the case, he'd be waiting a long time, because I have no plans to ever start, but my BF might decide he wants to in about five years. And heaven forbid he get spoiled before then...

"I posted a thread here last year, about how the Facebook Page for "Being Human" (UK) revealed the death of a major character in Season 4 immediately after the episode had gone to air in the UK. The consensus on that thread appeared to be "as soon as the episode airs, it's fair game for the internet. People in different countries / timezones should stay off the internet if they don't want to be spoiled."

The concern here is twofold. First, the spoiler was is a review for another game. While it's reasonable to expect that you may see spoilers for a show on the FB page for that show, in this case the spoiler wasn't related to the game under review, it was for a different game, and that does change things. Second, in most discussions I saw, it was considered polite to mark spoilers even while the posters took a more "fair game" attitude about the spoilers existing at all.

There's also the consideration when something was released vs. when you're discussing it. If the tv show aired yesterday, don't talk about things openly today. It's all very subjective, particularly since some people consider hings like "Could you believe that twist?" to be a huge spoiler, or information from a tv show's "Next week on" to be spoilers.

That is something i do consider too. When i talk with friends about games, movies or tv shows i always ask if they plan on watching/playing it themselves so i won't spoil them.

The concern here is twofold. First, the spoiler was is a review for another game. While it's reasonable to expect that you may see spoilers for a show on the FB page for that show, in this case the spoiler wasn't related to the game under review, it was for a different game, and that does change things. Second, in most discussions I saw, it was considered polite to mark spoilers even while the posters took a more "fair game" attitude about the spoilers existing at all.

Virg

I think in my case you also have to consider that the Lets Player has a record of crossing over different games and talking about a game while playing a totaly different one.For Example. You can watch him Play Battlefield 3 with his squad while he's talking about the Development blog of DayZ.Or you start out watching a new Minecraft episode by him only to watch him walk through a portal and suddenly "appear" (of course its all edited ) in the 7 Days to Die Game and so on.

Last of Us and DayZ might be different games in quality and background story but they definetly have the same underlaying message while playing."You have to do morally questionable things to survive this Zombie outbreak"

In The Last of Us you realize this within the very first 10-15 minutes. So its not like Frankie said " Just like in the end of The Last of us where the Butler killed Joel with the Candlestick in the Library"

I'd post a link to Frankies first The last of us episode, but i don't know if i'm allowed to. If someone would like to have a go at his Walkthrough or just take a peek just give me a PM and i'll send you the link.

I guess from the other commenter's point of view he didn't know how much of a spoiler the comment was and it does specifically mention that it's referring to the end of the game. I had a tv show spoiled on a blog I read which is in no way connected to tv shows. I'm guessing the show aired a while ago in the states but the UK is only two episodes into the season. I wouldn't have read the comment if I'd know it was going to mention the show I'm currently watching. I appreciate that in this case it's the same genre but it's not like it's the third in a series and the guy mentioned the end of the second one, they're two different games.

I'm not a gamer, but per Pen^2's comment, I'd think three months is enough. After about a month, it's on you to avoid info. For tv, 48 hours, book depends on length, but a week for long stuff, maybe less for YA fiction. Movie depends on availability, but a week or two, depending if sequel or source material.

I think how major the spoiler is matters too. If you're spoiling the main *point*, say the twist ending of a twist ending movie, or the murderer in a mystery novel, that is way different than just mentioning, "I wasn't happy with the way X character acted towards the end" or something.